Something terrible could be happening in Parliament on Monday…

Last Thursday there was a curious announcement in the Chamber of the House of Commons. At the session to announce future business, Leader of the House, Andrew Lansley said this:

“Monday 14th July — consideration of a Bill, followed by a motion to approve the first report from the Committee on Standards on the respect policy”

If you look on Parliament’s web site tonight, you will not see the name, nor the text of the Bill to be considered.

None of your elected backbench MPs have been told what Bill is to be debated on Monday. It’s Wednesday evening. Tomorrow, MPs are on a ‘one line whip’ ie they can return to their constituencies this evening.

Imagine how outrageous it would be, if tomorrow, the government were to announce emergency legislation to an empty chamber. Imagine if that emergency legislation was to be introduced on Monday or Tuesday, with the intention of it slipping through the Commons and the Lords in a single day. Imagine if that Bill was the deeply controversial Data Retention Bill.

It’s a Bill that will override the views of judges who have seen how the mass collection of your data breaches the human rights of you and your family.

Regardless of where you stand on the decision of the European Court of Justice, can you honestly say that you want a key decision about how your personal data is stored to be made by a stitch up behind closed doors and clouded in secrecy?

None of your MPs have even read this legislation, let alone been able to scrutinise it.

The very fact that the Government is even considering this form of action, strongly suggests that they have an expectation that the few people on the Liberal Democrat and Labour front benchers who have seen this legislation, are willing to be complicit.

No matter what you think about this issue, if you care about democracy, make sure your MP does not walk through the chamber and vote for legislation nobody has had the chance to debate and question.

15 thoughts on “Something terrible could be happening in Parliament on Monday…”

Monday 14 July—Consideration of a Bill, followed by a motion to approve the first report from the Committee on Standards on the respect policy.

Commons Select Committee on Standards
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Committee on Standards)

The Commons Select Committee on Standards is appointed by the House of Commons to oversee the work of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards.
It came into being on 7 January 2013 as one half of the replacements for the Committee on Standards and Privileges. The latter committee was divided into the Committee on Standards and Committee of Privileges in order that the Standards Committee might employ lay members.

Reblogged this on Beastrabban’s Weblog and commented:
Further evidence of the Tories’ determination to turn this into a surveillance state, and a call to action. This is truly alarming, as the government seems determined to withhold any information on the act to be debated. I’ve commented before on the Kafkaesque nature of Cameron’s government, in which arbitrary dictatorship, prosecution, and the deliberate withholding of official information is seen as normal part of government practice. This is further proof.

Do? Yes, sit back and wonder at the suggestion that somehow the Country is ‘ruled’ by the European Union when, at any time which suits it, our Establishment can cobble together any legislation they wish and then, via their ‘dirt’ lists, force our “democratically elected” representatives to concur with their USA inspired demagoguery. This ‘law’ – as mooted on Radio 4 this morning – will not stop terrorists before they strike (if you believe that sort of stuff) but will allow us to catch them via their phone records after they’ve succeeded. It will also allow our authorities to protect vulnerable children against exploitation. I await the first criminal trial which supports this latter assertion with keen anticipation. Meanwhile, one of the learned people who is somehow involved in legislation in Europe, Baroness Sarah Ludford, also said on BBC today regarding the European Arrest warrant that “criminals are adept at skipping over borders”. That’s because you got rid of them Ms Ludford.

No – it goes to the vote on Monday, as stated in the article.
Interesting that it says Miliband backs it, when the only Labour quote comes from Tom Watson, in condemnation of the proposed fast-track law. You should probably take it with a pinch of salt (or indeed an entire shaker).